Perspectives on Diversity and Culture

The people that I decided to talk with are a co-worker (Caucasian), my sister in law (Hispanic) and my youngest son’s preschool teacher (African-American) who just moved to Tennessee from California.  The person that I feel in some ways isdifferent culturally is my sister in law.  She is Hispanic and her religion is Catholic. When I asked each of them to define culture and diversity this is what they each stated:

Co-Worker (Caucasian) defined culture as a set of values within a family.  He defined diversity as people with different opinions, backgrounds religious beliefs, political beliefs, sexual orientations, heritage, and life experiences.

Sister in Law (Hispanic) defined culture as a belief system within a group of people or family.  She defined diversity as anything that sets one individual apart from another (gender, race, ethnicity, and more recently sexual orientation differences).

Pre-school teacher (African-American) defined culture as a way in which we live.  Our music, foods we eat, and family traditions.  She went on to explain that culture is something that can come from a variety of combined things like lifestyles, religion, class etc.  She defined diversity as a wide range of interests, backgrounds and experiences

When speaking with them all their views on culture and diversity was pretty much inline with what I have been learning the course so far.  An example would be we all believe that culture is the values and beliefs that we are accustom too or part of our family traditions.  

This assignment has gotten me to expand on my knowledge of different cultures within my family.  I thought that I knew my sister in law well but I never asked her about her culture.  She explains to me that her culture and religion is very important to her and she was so excited to share many things with me and the rest of my family.  I’m so excited that this assignment brought awareness to me on the importance of making everyone feel welcome and respected regardless of their culture.  An example that she gave was never making a decision with asking her husband because he is head of the house.  She explained that a wife shouldn’t work but staying at home to care for the children, home and the needs of her husband.  There were many family and culture experiences she shared with me and I’m grateful that I got to learn more about her personally because I want her to feel respected and valued in our family.